


Notebooks

by pantheon_of_discord



Series: Season 13 Codas [5]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Coda, Episode: s13e05 Advanced Thanatology, I know it's tagged with MCD but it's more in an inevitable kind of way than anything, M/M, but with some fluff mixed in kinda?, it's hopeful!, it's not a sad ending!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-10
Updated: 2017-11-10
Packaged: 2019-01-31 11:18:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12680817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pantheon_of_discord/pseuds/pantheon_of_discord
Summary: "Dean. Every notebook, on this particular shelf, tells a version of how you die."But which one's right?





	Notebooks

_#18_

 

Jack, the nephilim, power beyond anything the Earth has ever seen, has both Winchesters suspended in mid-air. Rings of glowing, golden energy ripple out from his raised hand. They match his eyes.

The Devil is behind him, whispering.

“All they ever wanted was to _use_ you, Jack. Both of them. They never cared about you. They _feared_ you. They could never understand.”

Jack is uncertain, shaking. His eyes dart away.

His hold is tight, and Sam struggles to speak. “Don’t trust him, Jack! He’s lying to you – that’s what he does. _He’s_ the one who wants to use you, not us.”

“Jack, listen to me,” Dean tries, voice straining with effort. “Your mom didn’t want this. Cas doesn’t want this. You’ve got people who care about you, people who –”

“These boys don’t know how to care for anyone but themselves,” Lucifer hisses. “Think of what they’ve done to you. Think of what they’ve put you through. I’ve never harmed you, Jack. I would _never_ harm you.”

Jack only looks more torn. It’s no longer just him that’s shaking, it’s the very ground beneath his feet. The towering trees, every blade of grass – it all trembles, violently, on the verge of implosion. Jack’s eyes widen in fear. Fear of _himself_ , of what he can do.

Then, as ever, the fatal Winchester mistake: Dean takes advantage of Jack’s distraction, fighting against the iron grip of power to reach for the holy oil.

“ _NO_ ,” Jack cries, his hand moving once in a knee-jerk twitch.

Dean Winchester’s neck snaps.

 

 

_#94_

 

“I’m tellin’ ya, Cas, it’s a _terrible_ sandwich.”

“Sam likes it.”

The old, black car is cruising down a long stretch of blacktop. The sky is a spotty canvas of pearl-grey and cerulean, the sun dipping in and out as the winds blow.

“Yeah well, that’s Sam for you. Peanut butter and banana, though? What the hell has he been teaching you? I mean, I know you’re rockin’ the real, human taste buds again, but there’s no need to _punish_ yourself.”

“I’m not!” Castiel says, chin jutting forward, defiant. “I happen to like peanut butter. And I’ve discovered that I like bananas, too.”

“Yeah, I _know_ you do,” Dean says back, with a suggestive wiggle to his eyebrows.

Castiel rolls his eyes, but his cheeks go a little pink.

Dean’s tint as well, and he looks back out the front window, clearing his throat. “So, um, anyway,” he starts, voice much quieter. “Sam was gonna head out this afternoon, said something about checking out this museum event thing in Wichita.”

“Um, yes, he mentioned,” Castiel says, also staring through the windshield with rather undue concentration.

“Yeah, well, uh. . . we’ve.” Dean swallows visibly. “He – he was gonna grab a motel, stay over. Guess. . . we’ve got the bunker to ourselves tonight.”

Castiel nods, slowly. “I suppose so.”

Dean’s breathing seems shallow, his shoulders rising and falling rapidly, but his eyes are bright. “Yeah. That’s. . . yeah.” A slow grin crinkles the corners of his eyes.

Finally turning in his seat, Castiel answers with a smile of his own. It fades after a moment. “When are we going to tell him?” he asks quietly.

“Soon,” Dean says quickly, swallowing again. “I want to. But, y’know. . .”

“Yeah. I know.”

“Besides,” Dean says, turning sideways as the cheeky grin returns to his face. “The sneakin’ around thing’s kinda fun, right?”

Castiel rolls his eyes again, but nods. “Yes, it is, actually.” His smile is wide, his eyes are warm.

They’re so caught up in staring at one another, neither of them notice the F-150 barreling towards the intersection.

It broadsides them at 71 miles per hour.

Castiel wakes up in a hospital bed two and a half weeks later.

Dean Winchester was pronounced D.O.A.

 

 

_#177_

 

The three men stand shoulder-to-shoulder on a black hilltop, the grass crispy, burnt away, curling.

“What we wanted, right?” Sam says softly, gaze tracing the horizon, fire reflected in his eyes.

Dean nods. “Yep. Blaze of glory.”

“It does seem very. . . _us_ ,” Castiel agrees. He’s almost smiling. Almost.

Bright red lightning spikes, mere feet away, but none of them flinch.

The air is smoky-grey, and the sky itself is cracked with yellow-orange fissures – hundreds of them, thousands, more. A million different worlds, all on the brink of collapse.

A house of cards.

“It’s worth it,” Castiel says, resolute as stone. “This, _us_ , here. It’s worth it.”

“Ain’t no place I’d rather be,” Dean says.

Sam shakes his head, but he smiles. “And it’ll work, right?”

“Yes. It’ll work,” Castiel says firmly.

“Alright, then.” Keeping his eyes forward, Dean reaches out with his left hand and grasps his brother’s shoulder. His other hand sneaks out blindly to his right until it finds Castiel’s. Their fingers weave together. “See ya on the other side, fellas.”

Dean Winchester squeezes Castiel’s hand, tight, before the spell takes effect and he ceases to be.

 

 

_#233_

 

The wendigo creeps silently through the tangled underbrush, unseen by both brothers. Dean holds the flare gun up, at the ready, but his grip is laxer than it should be. His knuckles have grown knobby with arthritis.

“ _Sam_ ,” he hisses into the darkness, squinting through the cheap, drugstore glasses that Castiel had insisted he start wearing.

Sam is, in fact, more than fifty feet to the north, and his good ear is turned away.

So he doesn’t hear the light, barely-there rustle of the wendigo, as it takes its final, leaping strides towards Dean.

Sam does hear its shriek though, mingled with Dean’s scream of pain.

He’s already almost gone by the time Sam reaches him. Blood bubbles from his lips and practically floods from the tears in his chest.

“Dean, _Dean,_ no, hang on, hang on, I’ll get you help,” Sam babbles.

“S’okay, Sammy,” Dean chokes. “Jus’ too slow. Gettin’ too slow now.”

“Shut up. You’re gonna be fine, Dean.”

With the last of his failing strength, Dean reaches out a hand, fisting it in Sam’s jacket. “C-Cas. Sammy, you gotta tell ‘im. You gotta. . . _Cas_.” His voice trails off, his eyes starting to drift closed.

“Damn it, Dean, stay with me. And Cas knows, man. He knows.” Tears start to drip down Sam’s cheeks. “God, you idiots. Everybody knows.”

“No –” A wracking cough sends Dean’s body seizing. “No, Sam, _promise_. Promise you’ll –”

Sam shakes his head, almost blind now by his tears. “I’ll tell him. I promise, Dean, I _promise_.”

“S-Sammy. . .”

Dean Winchester dies a hunter’s death, at age fifty-nine.

 

 

_#302_

 

Castiel has hidden the car keys again.

“Hey, Cas? Did you check the table in the hall?”

“Twice, Dean,” Castiel says, infinitely patient, as always.

But today he’s sad as well.

“Damnit, I probably left them on the nightstand again,” Dean grumbles, and turns a rueful eye up the staircase. “Man, why the hell didn’t we get a bungalow? All these damn _stairs_.”

He grips one hand on the stair railing and pulls his cane level with his hip, but Castiel stops him with a gentle hand to the shoulder. “You’re not supposed to be driving anymore anyway, Dean,” he chastises with a fond smile. He’s let his vessel age, but his eyes are as clear and bright as they’d ever been.

“I wanna go get a burger, Cas.”

Castiel shakes his head. “You’re not supposed to be eating burgers anymore, either.”

Dean rolls his eyes, but turns around. “Well damnit, Cas, what the hell _am_ I allowed to do now?”

Smiling softly, Castiel answers by leaning in and brushing their lips together. Dean hums a little, so Castiel brings his worn and weathered hands up to rasp through the prickly, grey stubble on Dean’s cheeks.

“Damn, Cas,” Dean murmurs, leaning away. “Unless you got a bottle of those magic blue pills hiding somewhere, I think at least one of us is gonna be disappointed, here.”

“Never,” Castiel says, eyes holding Dean’s with a ferocity rarely seen nowadays. “Just sit with me?”

The day is misty and grey, but in a quiet, peaceful kind of way. The two of them sit on the battered living room couch all afternoon, arms intertwined and a blanket draped over their knees.

Hours later, as the sky starts to darken, Dean stands, planning to start on dinner.

But he only makes it halfway up, then his hand flies to his chest, and he collapses back down.

He gasps, face contorting in pain, and Castiel’s eyes fill with tears.

“I’ll be right there, Dean,” he says, turning on the sofa and bringing his hands up once again to cup Dean’s face. He draws his thumbs across Dean’s cheeks until his eyes open. “You won’t be alone, I’ll be there with you. I’m right behind you, I swear it, Dean.”

Dean’s gasping, his heart thudding out of rhythm, but he meets Castiel’s gaze and he nods.

There’s no fear in his eyes.

Dean Winchester dies of a heart attack, and Castiel follows right after him.

 

//

 

Billie slides one delicately manicured hand along the cover of the book.

There are hundreds of notebooks, hundreds of ways Dean Winchester’s story ends.

Hundreds of _choices_ , important choices, that only he can make. And everything _depends_ on him.

Time was, Billie couldn’t imagine betting on a Winchester.

But she closes her eyes and peers through the Veil. She sees a dark alleyway, lit by a neon cross and the yellowy bulb of a pay phone. She sees Dean, walking on shaky feet, straight into Castiel’s waiting arms.

Maybe. _Maybe_.

 _Alright_ , she thinks. _I’ll take that action_.

**Author's Note:**

> Can I just say how effing PLEASED I am that Billie is the new Death???? 
> 
> Damn, girl. 
> 
> Come find me on [tumblr](https://pantheonofdiscord.tumblr.com) and be my friend.


End file.
